In approximately 1880 the first time recorder was invented. It used a standard wind-up clock movement to rotate a calibrated disk on which there were numbered push buttons with sharp points to pierce the disk. Pushing the button would indicate the employee and time in or out. The success of this invention prompted improvements such as the printing type wheels and ribbons. These improvements required the use of mechanical devises such as cams, levers, springs and push pawls. In addition to the clock mechanisms for keeping the typewheels on time more sophisticated time recorders evolved as the work force and the need increased.
Large numbers of employees required individual time cards. At this point in time the time clock was a hard working machine. Building such a recorder with heavy steel and brass parts to take the beating, due to many employees, promoted wear and breakdowns no matter how well the parts were manufactured.
The ribbon had to be monitored and changed periodically and the time clock field service man was born at this point.
The cases for the clocks were built of oak and other beautiful hardwood. They were often tall with large pendulums for accuracy. They had design engraving on the faces and outer parts. As the requirement for more time clocks continued the days of fine workmanship and woodwork were nearing a close. Steel cased clocks, small job cost recorders and bell ringing devices arrived. Mass production of compact time recorders of every conceiveable type and use increased.
The time clock continued to print the time and operated with standard mechanical devices not too different in operation from it's 1880 grandfather. The present design of time clocks is basically the same, however, materials for the parts have changed to higher profit items using such things as plastics. The time clock still uses timing motors to push spring loaded levers and pawls to pick up one tooth of a sixty-tooth rachet, then drops off the motor cam to advance the type wheel one minute. This happens every minute of the day. Many other operations are all done with levers, cams, springs and push pawls in a variety of shapes and designs.
The time recorder has always done one basic thing, it has printed the time on a chart or time card. The employee time card is an extremely important piece of information. Most state laws and in addition many union agreements require that hourly employees must have their hours of employment recorded in a manner which can be easily checked. The usual time card has served this purpose for many years. It gives the employee a printed record of his time of arrival and time of departure. In certain legal disputes and labor disputes this printed record is a requirement. However, the printed time-card record produced by the normal time clock is not usable in an automated time worked system. This is because most data processing systems use paper tape or magnetic tape or even punched cards to input the information to a computer. In the processing systems to date, it is necessary for a person to pick up the reel of paper or magnetic tape covering the payroll periods and then process these reels of tape through a computer where the functions of computing the time worked are performed. The only other alternative has been to have a complicated and expensive computer on the premises to perform the time keeping functions as well as the payroll functions.
Thus, a tremendous need exists in the field for a small inexpensive time clock system which both gives a printed time card which is required by law and, contained within itself, keeps a record of the total number of hours worked by an employee during a given pay period without the extraordinary expense of a computer system.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a new time clock recorder device which utilizes no ribbons, no typewheels, no mechanical moving parts, no timing motor, no printing hammer and requires practically no maintenance.
Yet a further object of this invention is to provide a recording time clock which automatically changes the month and date, on which a reset for a power failure is not necessary, and which within itself calculates the total hours worked for a given pay period, such as a week, for each employee.
As stated above standard methods of time printing by standard time clocks use a mechanical device consisting of type wheels together with an ink ribbon and a solenoid actuated hammer type assembly to print the time, controlled by a special clock timing motor linked to the printing type.
Mechanisms are used to trigger the print, wind the ribbon and transfer the proper sequence timing to the hour, data and day of each type wheel.
The month type wheel is always manually set as mechanical spring and lever principals that would comprehend the odd day of ammonth would be too complicated to manufacture.
The standard time clock unit is subject to constant abuse by itself due to its own design. Hammering and rubbing itself to pieces, it must be maintained as any mechanical unit must. Inevitably it will need replacement or major overhauling to guarantee troublefree use, which as a general rule costs about fifty percent of replacement cost. Also, once the standard time clock has printed the time on the time card, the total time worked by an employee in a given pay period must be computed by an individual employee bringing in human error.
While some computers have been developed which keep such records and thus compute weekly payroll totals these computers are extremely expensive and practical for only large corporations, and they keep date on a magnetic or paper punch tape. The cost of these computers, however, is out of reach to the average small business employer. It is a further object, therefore, of the present invention to provide a low cost time record device which in addition to the previous benefits heretofore states is inexpensive enough to be readily affordable by small businesses, for instance those who employ only 25 to 125 employees, who cannot possibly afford a computer system.